Chop Chop
by InDexterWithdrawl
Summary: Lumen's new found love of cooking


2nd fanfic ever. Not related in story to the one I just posted, but basically that first one was so angsty I wanted to write something fun after...

disclaimer: I own nothing, it all belongs to the wonderful people who make Dexter.

spoilers: all of Season 5

* * *

CHOP CHOP

_Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop_

"Lumen."

_Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop_

"LUMEN!"

"Hunh?" she finally raised her eyes.

"Don't you think those onions are diced quite enough?" her mother asked. "They only needed to be cubed."

"Oh... yes, there you go... sorry." she picked up the chopping board and with a flourish, swept the onions into the bottom of the roasting pan.

"What's next?" she asked.

"Carrots - in chunks."

"Oh, OK." Lumen replied, a little bashfully.

She fetched them from the fridge and started to peel them. Funny how therapeutic it was to chop things up. She was getting a little too into it. She grabbed the peeler and got to work.

_Shhht_

Off went a layer of rough carrot skin.

_Shhht_

and again

_Shhht Shhht Shhht_

Come to think of it, they did look a little like legs didn't they? The side of her mouth quirked in a shaky little smile.

_Shhht Shhht Shhht_

Next carrot.

She wondered who was hairier, Jordon or Cole.

_Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht_

Probably Alex.

_Shhht Shhht_

Next carrot.

_Shhht Shhht_

He looked Irish.

_Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht_

Next carrot. Now that she was getting into the rhythm of it.

_Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht_

It was quick work to flay the carrot skin off.

_Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht_

Next carrot.

_Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht_

*Flay, flay, flay, flay, flay, flay, flay* she mused with every stroke.

She held this one up to the light, it was a bumpy one and she didn't want any imperfections. It was perfect. She grinned.

Next carrot.

_Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht_

She wondered if Dexter had ever done this to people's legs, just for fun. Next carrot.

_Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht Shhht_

Probably too messy...

"That's enough carrots" her mother interjected. She had learned to keep an eye on her.

"OK." Lumen cleaned the peelings out of the sink and put them aside into her little bag of cuttings. Then she moved everything back to the cutting board.

_Chop_

She started by removing the carrot tops and edges and putting them into the little bag.

_Chop Chop_

Hm, like cutting up little legs.

_Chop Chop Chop Chop_

"Lumen..."

_Chop Chop Chop_

"LUMEN."

She looked back up at her mother, a little startled. "What?" She looked down at her board. "What is it now?"

"Stop putting the good pieces in the bag."

She looked, sure enough there was almost a full carrot's worth of pieces of carrot chunks in there with the shavings and edges.

"Sorry." she moved them back to the board.

"Where IS your head?"

"Sorry, sorry!" she gushed. "I just kind of loose track in the rhythm of all the cutting." She casually brandished the chopping knife in a circle beside her to make her point.

Her mother stepped back a little from the large knife being spun half-hazardly in the air.

"Kind of like it now actually." she proceeded to keep working on the carrots.

_Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop Chop_

"Did you cook a lot in Miami?" her mother ventured a tenuous guess. Lumen didn't like to talk about Miami, at all really.

She flicked her eyes back up to her from the cutting board. "Sort of..." she trailed off.

_Chop Chop Chop_

Her mother knew that was the last she would get out of her about that subject. Oh well.

"Well, you can do the rest of the chopping then - I hate it. Bores me. The potatoes are next."

"Oh good." She brightened as she swept the last of the carrot chunks into the pan. The bigger potatoes reminded Lumen of little torsos.

Finally, all the vegetables for the roasting pan were done and it was time to put the turkey on top.

"I hate this part." her mother said. "the raw flesh."

Lumen just looked at her. "Don't be squeamish mom. Its just a dead bird." rather business-like, she clutched the bird with both arms and moved it from the defrosting bowl to the rest on the vegetables in the pan in one swift movement. "There, that OK?"

Her mother was looking at her strangely. "Other way..." What had happened to the daughter who had been grossed out when her cousin chased her with a worm? While she was in college?

Lumen promptly flipped the animal. "There.. - Oh... what's that..." Something flopped inside the bird. Lumen spread the turkey legs and peered matter-of-factly inside the opening that was the turkey's arse. "Entrails?" she asked in a puzzled tone.

"Eww! No Lumen!" maybe she hadn't been cooking after all. "Do you really think they would give us a bird with entrails? That's unsanitary! Its the giblets."

That actually cracked her up a bit. "The - wha? What body part is the 'giblets'?"

"I don't KNOW!" her mother huffed at being laughed at. "Its the gross stuff in the bag! I just throw it out."

Lumen tilted her head to consider that, and, bare handed, reached in to get the bag. Her hand grasped something loose and bony instead. She pulled it out to inspect it.

"LUMEN!" her squeamish mother yelled. "That's disgusting!"

"Its OK!" she yelled back, "I washed my hands! You must have done this all the other years anyway!"

Her mother quieted, "I get your father to do it." she pouted, "I usually don't watch."

Lumen rolled her eyes and returned her attention to the object in hand. *A neck. Hm. Bony.* she tossed it haphazardly into the garbage. Pulled out the bag.

"Well? What's in that thing?" Her mother asked.

"Turkey neck." Lumen was peering into the dripping bag she had cradled in her hand. "and a heart, liver... and that looks like a stomach - kind of..."

Lumen presented the bag in her mother's general direction. Seeing her flinch was really funny. "Can you make anything out of this?" Her mouth tugged in a kind of smile. The tiny heart looked about the size of what she had expected Jordon to have had - before she had chopped him up of course. She looked at it again curiously.

"I don't want to!" Her mother growled. "Just throw it away - now please!" she had backed so far against the kitchen cabinets she was almost sitting on top of them.

Lumen actually giggled. "With pleasure!" And with that she did a little basketball toss to throw the turkey parts in the kitchen garbage pail. She paused for a second to regard the pail. *Funny,* she thought, *I think that's exactly how I tossed in Alex's head!* _"Three points!" _Dexter had quipped. She giggled again at the memory.

*This time I think I crossed the fowl line.* Then she guffawed to herself.

Her mother's exasperated tone snapped her back to reality and left no room for argument. "Why don't you take a break from the kitchen Lumen."

She turned to regard her perplexed, perturbed mother, and finally realized she had probably gotten a little too into her own private jokes. "OK." She hummed as she washed her hands, removed her apron and, whistling, went into the living room. She hadn't felt so good in a long time.

She decided she really liked chopping things in the kitchen.


End file.
